An expanded Bloomingdale Park is the best hope for a South Shore community in dire need of public athletic facilities.
Staten Island Advance File Photo

As a kid, my parents were often telling me, “A promise is a promise.” Later, the teenager was told: “A man’s word is his bond.”

Well, we are now approaching the 10-year anniversary of the compromise plan for Bloomingdale Park announced by Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Bloomingdale Park, championed by Borough President James Molinaro, would be scaled back and the losses the active-recreation-park-starved South Shore suffered there would be made up by a second site, Fairview Park. The new Charleston park was tentatively scheduled to open in the summer of 2004.

Since then, this writer has written so much about the delays caused by the city Economic Development Corporation that Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment has begun to look like a short story by comparison.

Well, we may be approaching the final chapter of the ordeal, although it will hardly be one worth waiting for.

Tuesday, at 6 p.m. at the Tides in Charleston, the Staten Island Economic Development Corporation will hold a public meeting to discuss the city Economic Development Corporation’s plan for the 63.5 acres which includes Fairview Park.

The plan should be a signal for Molinaro to restart his campaign for the original Blooomingdale Park.

Here’s what the mayor promised for Fairview in December 2002 to compensate for Bloomingdale’s being scaled down to one baseball field, one softball field and an overlapping football/soccer field: one baseball field, one softball field, one Little League field, two soccer/football fields, basketball courts and tennis courts.

Here’s what the South Shore, aka Community Board 3’s 150,000-plus residents, will get according to the latest city Economic Development Corporation plan: one multi-purpose (soccer/football) field, five tennis courts and two “junior” baseball fields which appear to be so small they are either for kids under 10 — or for wiffle ball.

At the time of the 2002 compromise, NYC Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe, who has recently resigned, probably in frustration of Parks’ being low man on the city agency totem pole, said that the number of facilities would stay the same even if the actual layout changed.

Well, what’s left of the promised athletic facilities has been moved to the middle of the Charleston site. They are basically only accessible by car, and one of the two parking lots (60 cars total) is approximately a half-mile of winding trails from the football/soccer field.

Tuesday night, don’t berate the messengers, the Island Economic Development Corporation, about the city’s failed promise — if it even comes up for discussion. The likes of a library, a school, senior citizens housing and, of course, another big-box store will be on the Charleston agenda.

Instead, commit to joining Molinaro in a “Back to Bloomingdale” crusade.

With Great Kills Park’s indefinite closure due to possible contamination and the city’s failed Fairview promise, an expanded Bloomingdale is best hope for a South Shore community in dire need of public athletic facilities. 